Joe M. O'Connell: May 2009

Friday, May 29, 2009

Joe and Kasey Lansdale

I had the pleasure of interviewing legendary Texas author Joe Lansdale this week for an upcoming Austin Chronicle story, and learned a lot of his stories began as dreams. Here he is after lunch at Threadgill's with his daughter Kasey Lansdale, who is a singer/songwriter.

A full pickle day

A full day with Nicholas, starting with a haircut...

We finally found a way to avoid the tears--haircuts in a hotrod!

We made a stop at a local park for a quick slide.

On the way to Gymboree with a new doo (and lots of trucks).

Getting hand stamps after play with the 2-year-old crew.

When Casey came to town...

He wasn't here long, but my older (much older! heh) brother Casey briefly appeared in Austin this week. Here he is at the Frisco with cousins from different fathers Tim and Mike.

Should 'Waco' film get Texas incentives?

That's the subject of my latest Dallas Morning News SHOT IN TEXAS column. Your thoughts?

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

At the Gulfstream

A cool dude goes poolside.

I'm staying down here!

The Gulfstream at dusk.

In the pool with Mommy.

Monday, May 18, 2009

Beach!

We're at the Gulfstream on North Padre Island where my family used to own a condo. It's fittingly Nicholas' first trip to the beach. These are photos as he discovered the sand, surf and seagulls tonight. He took off down the beach and loved it all.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

We're headed to the beach!

Sunday, May 10, 2009

A Mother's Day poem

The artist

The artist never marries.
No kids to prod and poke.
Her hollow dog eats prime rib
as life drifts by like smoke.

Stumbling on perfect legs of clay,
She trails the anxious shepherd
high into hills above the city
where art and truth are severed.

She says this path is mine.
I must suffer, play, ruminate,
ignore your ocean eyes,
lest my words not propagate.

Golden child, he will not wait
For art for artists’ sake.
He lolls upon your lovely lap
and skips across the lake.

Thus I am the artist
you my finest pen.
Our greatest tale unfolds
each day anew again.

For Tiffany
Mother’s Day, 2009
Joe O’Connell

What they're saying about EVACUATION PLAN

"Tales alternately gentle, dramatic, surrealistic, that collectively affirm the beauty of being alive, even as they acknowledge that all of us face the necessity of making our own 'evacuation plan.' "
-- Brad Buchholz, Austin American-Statesman

" The chapters about Matt and the short stories demonstrate O’Connell’s ability to develop sympathetic, true-to-life characters using intriguing details and compelling dialogue. The stories remind us of those times when a brief encounter with a stranger left us wondering about that person’s past. In Evacuation Plan, O’Connell satisfies that curiosity. "
-- The Texas Observer

"It was very hard for me to put this book down. It carries us through the deepest meaning in life and most painful, most hopeful memories for a wide range of fascinating characters. Based in a hospice, this book could have easily resorted to cheap sensationalism, or whacked us upside the head with stereotypic melodrama, but instead it was respectful, honest, and tender. The characters will stay with you - you may even recognize some of them within your own life. "
-- Award-winning author Carmen Tafolla

"An excellent, thought-provoking diversion from our own inevitable plummet toward the grave, and we highly recommend it to you, the living."
-- Wayne Alan Brenner, The Austin Chronicle

"O’Connell has drawn some colourful and believable characters. The material relating to the hospice and terminal care rings true, all the way to reconciliation and forgiving."
-- Dr. Roger Woodruff, International Association for Hospice & Palliative Care

"The tales are nicely written, and some are quite compelling; “The Male Nurse,” for one, is a dreamlike reverie."
-- Texas Monthly

“Evacuation Plan: A Novel From The Hospice by Joe M. O'Connell is nothing short of remarkable … a novel that walks hand-in-hand with death and yet, somehow, the reader finishes the book feeling inspired to live.”
– The Paisano

"A wonderful blend of lives ordinary but with sometimes extraordinary elements. We all share these stories of life in some way, despite moments of harshness or unforgiving pain. There is always a common thread of humanity and ultimately forgiveness to be found, even if it's in the last moment of life."
-- Elaine Williams, author of A Journey Well Taken

"Reading Evacuation Plan is akin to unwrapping a series of small perfectly-chosen presents. Both human and humane, The book resembles a modern Spoon River Anthology with its vivid, touching glimpses into the lives of those in and around a hospice."
-- Tim McCanlies, screenwriter The Iron Giant, writer/director Secondhand Lions

"In Evacuation Plan Joe O'Connell does for the process of dying what Sherwood Anderson did for middle America in Winesburg, Ohio--he shows us in brief flashes the aching beauty of the grotesque, and shows us how extraordinary small lives and quiet deaths can be."
--John Blair, Drue Heinz Literature Prize winning author of American Standard

"Here's a book so rich with stories of the living, so filled with people's bountiful problems, as well as incidents of wry forgiveness, one realizes over and over the circling forces of life's completeness. It's not a sad tale nor a needless feel-good account but a balanced, sometimes comic, affirmation of what is here and what we all know is waiting."
-- Carolyn Osborn, award-winning short story writer

"The broken, the hopeful, the frustrated, the clueless, and the forgiving touch one another with words, remembrances, and hands. Inevitably, readers will quietly wonder about their own evacuation plan."
-- Will's Texana Monthly

O'Connell's protagonist skillfully navigates under the guise of a writer seeking raw materials for his craft in the stories of the dying, but mines and refines instead the stuff we're all made of. In this finely crafted novel, we come away with much more than the astute observation that many of the best stories begin at the end. But, then again, that notion is also worth a lot.
--Jesse Sublett, cancer survivor, rocker and author of Never the Same Again

"Joe O'Connell's Evacuation Plan--this Decameron of the hospice--encompasses a paradox. Death comes for everyone, but death is the only human universal because everyone dies, and witnesses dying, with private, unspeakable shame. Yet there are a few minutes left to speak. As people die, they tell stories which spawn new stories, which remind us that death is agony, a violent struggle, but so is living."
-- Debra Monroe, Flannery O'Connor Award winning author of Newfangled and Shambles

Joe M. O'Connell